“Shit Koreans Say” is a You Tube video starring J-REYEZ and Lydia Paek (is that 박?), two Candian artists who are ethnically Korean but claim they don’t speak the language very well. I was surprised to read this as their pronunciation is really good for most of it, and I was only really able to notice a couple of slightly unnatural word choices on a second, more detailed listen.

I’m posting this because it’s funny but also because these are all phrases you should know as a Korean learner. They’re all extremely common and are good evidence for the famous fiery temperament of Koreans which has them sometimes known as the Italians of Asia!

I’ve transcribed the phrases in Korean below the video. Note the use of ‘~’ added as a suffix in Korean, which indicates the drawing out of a syllable. I’ve also included a few extra usage notes from my own knowledge which I hope are useful. And finally, be careful with using some of these yourself as many are informal phrases (반말) meant for close friends or those younger than you.

I’m curious what level of Korean most of my readers have. It would help me to know so that I can focus on posting relevant content for that level.

I’ve created a poll – please fill it out and also leave a comment to let me know where you are at in your Korean learning journey. The number of words I’ve put are approximate estimates that I believe roughly equal each level – they are not intended to be hard and fast measures!

It’s been a very long time since I posted something on here other than a message saying that I was launching a new website or something like that (진짜.. 2년정인가요?) – but now I really am coming to you with an update worth reading! If you were a reader in the past then you’ll immediately notice the new (sexier) design and may also have noticed most the posts have disappeared. This is correct – they have. I’ve put them into review as a lot of them were only relevant to the history of this site and my development as a Korean speaker over two years ago. I will be reviewing and re-posting them over the next few weeks, so expect some re-done posts of old content. More excitingly, I will also be posting plenty of new content – including my translations and explanations of songs (particularly useful for beginners), and an update of my journey to becoming a fluent Korean speaker, and where I’m at and what I’m doing with my life now.

Thanks for sticking around, or if you are new then please comment and introduce yourself here. I look forward to meeting you soon!

Here is another podcast, ‘read through talking’ (수다로 읽다) which I discovered on Podics. I find the narrators’ voice very easy to listen to, so I sent him an email requesting a script and he very kindly responded with one from the first episode for me.

Back when I was living in Korea, I would often take photos of the short poems they have on the walls of the subway. I thought that they would make excellent study material for beginners because of their simplicity. Here’s my attempt to translate and explain a nice poem that I encountered one day.

Here are the first three episodes and transcripts of a very amusing Korean TV show called 남녀탐구생활. The Best translation I could come up with is “an investigation into the lives of men and women” but if anyone can suggest a better one then do let me know it.